For 103 years, the Boy Scouts of America has been a part of the fabric of this nation, providing its youth program of character development and values-based leadership training. In the past two weeks, Scouting has received an outpouring of feedback from the American public. It reinforces how deeply people care about Scouting and how passionate they are about the organization.

After careful consideration and extensive dialogue within the Scouting family, along with comments from those outside the organization, the volunteer officers of the Boy Scouts of America’s National Executive Board concluded that due to the complexity of this issue, the organization needs time for a more deliberate review of its membership policy.

To that end, the National Executive Board directed its committees to further engage representatives of Scouting’s membership and listen to their perspectives and concerns. This will assist the officers’ work on a resolution on membership standards. The approximately 1,400 voting members of the National Council will take action on the resolution at the National Annual Meeting in May 2013.

Our Scouting for Food event was once again a huge success and I want to take this opportunity to thank program coordinators Stella Lei and Ada Ip, the Den Leaders and all of the Scouts that participated.

Our scouts were able to fill a 6x10 trailer with donations for the needy and this large collection made quite an impression at the Food Bank collection center.

Thank you for helping make the Thanksgiving holiday a little brighter for those that are less fortunate. This event is at the heart of what Cub Scouts is about.

Happy Thanksgiving to you and your families. Have a safe and wonderful holiday.

As the school year is winding down to the last few days, I want to send one last Cubmaster message to all of you.

It has been a privilege & an honor to serve as your Cubmaster the past three Scouting years. It has been a big part of my life. As most of you know, my youngest son bridges over to Boy Scouts next year, so this year marks my last year as Cubmaster. Don’t worry though, I still plan to be very involved next year as Cubmaster Emeritus & mentor to our new Cubmaster Macey Zavala!

I truly believe that the scouting program offer our involved families a fantastic opportunity to bond & grow. We’ve developed many special lifelong friendships that I will always cherish. I want to thank each & every one of you.

As a Pack we rely on our volunteers and their commitment to the Pack. I especially want to thank the fantastic Pack leadership team headed by Committee Chair Scott. Running and managing a 90+ Pack is a challenge. The parent volunteers are what make everything possible. For those that volunteered and participated, the pack deeply thanks you. For those who have yet to volunteer, we welcome your future involvement. It is a great feeling to help our young scouts learn, develop & grow.

Hope you all have a great summer. Remember, we have a lot of Pack 1776 activities over the next few months:

USS Pampanito for a private tour of the submarine and a sleepover on June 11-12: Steve J, John P, Harry B